ABSTRACT
The first Copenhagen criterion of 1993 spells out the political conditions for EU membership. It includes a reference to ‘the respect for and protection of national minorities’. In theory, the political conditions have to be met before the EU opens accession negotiations with a candidate country. In practice, the European Commission has continued to monitor and criticise compliance with the political criteria, in particular the minority condition, throughout the negotiation process. Ultimately, the minority criterion has not been a key determinant in the EU’s assessment of an applicant country, and the EU’s leverage in this policy area had to be limited once the political conditions were officially considered as being ‘fulfilled’ and the accession negotiations got underway. The ambiguity of the minority criterion was further enhanced by the fact that the EU has promoted norms which lack a basis in EU law and do not directly translate into the acquis communautaire. 2 The gradual development of an EU ‘rights agenda’ had stayed clear of an explicit endorsement of minority rights and opened up only indirect avenues for the discussion and promotion of these rights. The Treaty of Maastricht (1992) entrenched specific provisions on fundamental rights and a vague Community commitment to ‘national and regional diversity’ within the member states (then Articles F TEU and 128 TEC). 3 Through the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the European Court of Human Rights, a direct link was established between EU membership and membership of the Council of Europe. In addition to the ‘burgeoning jurisprudence’ in the European Court of Human Rights (Gilbert 2002), the European Parliament has performed a showcase role for the EU, in particular during the early 1990s, by passing numerous resolutions on human rights and minority protection, thereby reinforcing the discourse swell on minority rights.
